Funding To UNIVERSITIES by the Arcadia Fund
Introduction
Courtesy of Casey Horner
Established in 2001, the Arcadia Fund was established by Harvard historian Lisbet Rausing and her husband Peter Baldwin, also a history professor who teaches at University of California, Los Angeles. The Arcadia Fund is one of the UK’s largest family foundations
Since its foundation, it has awarded $678m in disbursements.
It has a significant track record history of supporting universities. According to a study of 10 years of its giving, around 60% of its awards have been made to universities primarily in the UK and the US.
It allocates the majority of its funding to three core areas - preserving endangered culture, environmental causes and open access to information.
In the last ten reported years it has given $214m in grants to 21 universities and higher education institutions:
US universities are the biggest beneficiaries. 8 US universities received 61% of Arcadia Fund university giving, totalling $130m.
Yale University has received the largest volume of funding over the past decade. The top three university beneficiaries are Yale ($61m), Cambridge University ($52.6m) and the University of California, Los Angeles which has received ($32.1m).
The top 10 university beneficiaries are evenly split between UK and US institutions. Collectively they have received 96% of Arcadia university giving ($204.9m) over the past 10 years.
Cambridge University was the recipient of the single largest university donation in the past decade. It received $30.3m in 2018 to support a major environmental programme.
German universities are the third biggest group of beneficiaries. The Arcadia Fund has donated $5.4m to three German universities in the past three years.
The median average university funding award granted by the Arcadia Fund over the past 10 years is £570,000.